Royal Oak Tribune

State reports nearly 7K new virus cases

Statewide total reaches over 373K

- By Charles Crumm ccrumm@medianewsg­roup.com @crummc on Twitter

New confirmed Michigan coronaviru­s cases totaled 6,955 Wednesday with 81 new deaths as the more than eight-month old pandemic in the state shows signs of strengthen­ing.

To date, there has been 373,197 confirmed cases of the virus and 9,405 deaths.

Meanwhile, the state health department applauded a court ruling allowing the state to mandate the closing of indoor seating in restaurant­s, a three-week directive that expires in a week. Restaurant­s had challenged the directive.

“We are happy that today’s ruling keeps in place measures that will save lives by limiting specific indoor gatherings that greatly increase the risk of COVID-19 spread,” said Robert Gordon, director of the Michigan Health and Human Services Department.

“The science is settled: public health experts from around the nation and world say these types of actions must be taken to prevent the health care system from being overwhelme­d by COVID-19 cases,” Gordon said. “These protocols on specific indoor gatherings, along with wearing face masks, social distancing and frequent handwashin­g, give Michigan a fact-based approach to slow the spread of COVID-19 so we can return to a strong economy and get back to normal safely as soon as we can.”

Coronaviru­s numbers have spiked upwards during the fall, and most of the daily increases in new cases have occurred in the more populated counties in southeast Michigan.

There were 871 new confirmed cases and eight deaths in Oakland County reported Wednesday, 919 new cases and five deaths in Wayne County excluding Detroit, 862, new cases and three deaths in Macomb County, and 228 new cases and no deaths reported in Detroit.

Other areas that reported new higher cases of the virus Wednesday were Genesee County with 233 new cases and six deaths, and Kent County with 563 new cases and no deaths.

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